BACK in May 2001, then Opposition Leader, Hugh Desmond Hoyte and President Bharrat Jagdeo signed an agreement to, among other things, address the needs of depressed communities, which were identified.While the country may have had an economic programme at the time, it did not have a direct positive impact in communities across the country, thus giving rise to the need for special attention to the under-served to improve their socio-economic circumstances.
Oftentimes, tackling poverty alleviation, though it may form part of a national programme, requires a focused approach that would result in conceptualising and planning programmes to meet unique needs.
For instance, of primary importance to Plastic City, which is a depressed, thrown- up community, would be a Relocation Programme to identify house lots for the construction of homes.
The needs of Buxton, on the other hand, which is among the identified communities such as Non-Pareil/Enterprise, De Kinderen and Meten-Meer-Zorg, would more likely be addressing the hindrance to farming.
Unfortunately, then President Jagdeo never honoured the May 2001 agreement in its entirety, and in the absence of the needed attention, conditions in these communities have since deteriorated.
Since 2001, it is likely that other communities would have fallen into the depressed category. In failing to tackle poverty and its concomitant social ills in a concerted manner, the deprivations would be more severe.
Inaction on the part of the government also means that the communities at reference have been allowed to become dependent on other communities that directly benefit from the macro-economic programme.
In the case of Buxton, much of its farmlands have become idle due to poor access roads and drainage. Consequently, this has impacted the community’s ability for self-sufficiency in food, resulting in villagers becoming dependent on other communities to provide them with what they are quite capable of providing for themselves.
The under-utilisation of lands has created other disadvantages in areas such as employment and economic opportunities, which in turn have implications for development for self, community, and nation.
The challenges residents in Plastic City face have a far-reaching impact on the nation’s health. In this community, which has sprung up in Vreed-en-Hoop in response to a housing crisis, the residents are living in shacks and on the shoreline.
As the sea tide rises, the water runs under their homes, taking with it wherever it goes whatever faeces it picks up along the way. There is not only an absence of running water, but the likelihood of contracting water-borne diseases that can escalate into a health crisis.
President Jagdeo has had a decade in office since signing the Agreement, and could have used the opportunity to develop these communities.
When attention is paid to some communities while others are ignored, development is not only lopsided, but the environment is being created to nurture anti-social behaviours, forced migration, increased poverty and its attendant consequences.
Government must never be seen as being far removed from the realities around it, or insensitive and uncaring to the needs of the least and most vulnerable among us.
The Guyana Water Inc has taken potable water to Sophia, and the Ministry of Infrastructure has constructed a number of roads in the community, which is also considered depressed.
That this is happening under the David Granger/Moses Nagamootoo government, though it is not known if such movements have to do with the 2001 Agreement, these are steps in a progressive direction. If the government is being guided by the agreement then President Jagdeo refused to honour, this would be a constructive approach to governance. If, however, this is not the case, it may be opportune to dust off that agreement and seek to address a plight that is more than a decade overdue, and by extension has escalated the deprivations ten-fold.
Where Mr. Jagdeo, as President of Guyana, has failed the depressed communities that the Government and Opposition have both agreed deserve attention, the APNU+AFC government could find it worthwhile to pursue.
It is reasonable to expect that Mr. Jagdeo, who is now Leader of the Opposition, would give the government the cooperation and support.